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A long, rainy, construction zone-y drive and I’m home at last in Gainesville.  I’m always glad to be able to say “been there”, but Hilton Head, South Carolina isn’t a place I’d care to go again.  I’ll explain why tomorrow.  Right now I’m recording the Olympics and going to sleep.

HILTON HEAD ISLAND - I am in South Carolina for a few days while Miriam is at a conference.

The trip here, in a rented Hyundai Sonata, was surprisingly comfortable.  That’s a good little car.  It has every luxury, and appears to get incredibly good mileage.  We made a brief stop in Savannah for lunch, then arrived in South Carolina around 4:30.  This area differs from coastal Florida in a number of ways, though the most immediately obvious is the presence of trees, which is striking, considering how many hurricanes come through here.  Every shopping center and parking lot is wooded, and, in fact, the shopping areas are set back from the road, so you see unobtrusive signs along the street, in front of a wall of pine and oak.

The hotel is nice, if sprawling.  The hallways are long and the pool area covers a giant swath of land in the middle of the complex.  The balcony of our room looks over a pond with a fountain, and at night the frogs are very active.  The lobby is handsome, with elaborate wood paneling and millwork, and as I write people are enjoying complimentary lemonade and some other drink with whole strawberries in it.  This morning I attempted to get started reading Robinson Crusoe, but the splashing and cavorting of the guests at the pool, and the sound of the waves was too distracting for me.  I have been watching the swimming events from the Olympics on television.

Last night we went for a lovely walk along the beach, and it took us quite a distance north from our hotel.  The shore in front of the hotel had a goodly number of bathers, but a short distance up the coast it was practically deserted, and there were all manner of birds and bivalves and crabs.

The weather today is surprisingly cool, in the mid 70s, I’d say. It feels like Florida in the winter, since it’s also a bit overcast at the moment.  In a few minutes we’re going into town to have lunch and look at some old antebellum houses.

I foolishly forgot the power supply to my laptop, so I can only use this computer for as long as I have charge.  If  I don’t write again until Wednesday that is why.  The most unfortunate aspect of my absent-mindedness is that I won’t get to edit the photographs from the wedding I shot in St. Augustine last month.  That will be my top priority when I return to Gainesville.

Chicago is fantastic in every way.

We left Gainesville on Tuesday morning before sunrise.  In fact, I probably slept only three hours the night before, and Miriam didn’t sleep at all.  We were at Gainesville Regional Airport by 5 AM, and in Chicago by 10 AM (Central).  Midway is apparently the neglected step-child of Chicago airports.  We took a shuttle bus into the city, and arrived at our hotel hungry.

To solve that problem we started walking, past the busy hot dog vendor in the plaza downstairs from us, and ate instead in Millennium Park, which is a magical place.  Many others were there to picnic as well.  The weather was perfect - in the low 70s and breezy with white fluffy clouds over head.  As we ate our hot dogs we listened to an orchestra rehearse Wagner.  From there we crossed the gardens and Grant Park, stopping at Buckingham Fountain (which is enormous), before arriving at the Field Museum.  I had visited the Field Museum when I was a child, but that was so long ago I can recall very little of it.  I doubt I loved it as much then, too.  Everything was amazing, including the T. rex, the plant and animal dioramas, the cases of minerals, and the building itself.  They even had a temporary exhibit about mythical creatures, including the Unicorn, and I got to touch a narwhal horn which was once presented as having come from the mythical beast.  As Jeff might say, I harnessed the power of the Unicorn.

After all that walking we stopped and had delicious iced novelties at a stand along Lake Michigan.  It was the best snow cone in history.  For dinner we took a cab up to the tourist-centric Navy Pier, but I was determined to ride a huge Ferris Wheel, and we did.  It was great.  The moon was rising over the lake, the skyline of the city was spectacular.  It was one of life’s perfect moments.

I spent most of Wednesday with Burt, who, unfortunately couldn’t come to town by train, and had to drive instead, spending what must have been a fortune to park.  But we had lunch together, then took the subway to the Shedd Aquarium and Adler Planetarium.  At closing time we went out and sat on some steps by the harbor.  The weather was splendid, but it was as bright as could be.  The city looked majestic.  Once Miriam was finished with her work activities we all had dinner at Giordano’s, right around the corner from our hotel.  It was delicious, and filling.  Burt had to be heading home, but Miriam and I walked over to Millennium Park again to listen to an orchestral concert.  We heard Respighi’s Pines of Rome.  There were so many people out enjoying the evening, and we decided to do the same, once again visiting the popular sculpture Cloud Gate, which everyone seems to love.

I had the next day to myself, and I spent the morning walking around the Chicago River and taking photos of the architecture.  Our hotel was right near the Wrigley Building and the Tribune Building, and just a stone’s throw from Marina City. Then I rode a bus down to the Museum of Science and Industry, which is on the south side of the city.  Along the way the bus passed by an amazing number of old townhouses with fabulous steps and doorways.  I was impressed how even at such a distance from the Loop district, great numbers of people live in high-rise buildings, each of which must have impressive views of the city skyline or the lake. I had been to the Museum of Science and Industry when I was a child, and I remember at the time looking through the periscope of the U-505 submarine and seeing an old car parked in an alley.  They’ve since moved the captured Nazi vessel to its own subterranean wing of the complex. The tiniest part of the exhibit made the biggest impact on me.  It was a metal identification badge with an eagle on a swastika, above which are the words “GOTT MIT UNS”.  What a disgusting claim.  The museum has the largest, and therefore coolest model train layout I have ever seen.  I played with it for a long time.  Proof that it is a big museum: the 727 suspended above the aforementioned train layout and full size locomotive. I stared at the Foucault pendulum for a long time trying to understand it, to no avail.  Admission was free; bus fare was only $2, and we passed Soldier Field on the way back.  In the evening we went out to dinner, then explored the theater district en route to see Wicked at the Oriental Theater.  It was a fancy place, and I was a bit surprised that I actually enjoyed the show a great deal.  Credit must be given to the lead actresses, especially Annaleigh Ashford who played Glinda.  I can’t imagine enjoying anyone more in the role (except, perhaps, Kristen Chenoweth, but that’s no surprise).  I have seen video of other actresses in the role, and I know I would not have liked the show as much had I seen someone else in the part. In any case, the story and feel were far enough removed from The Wizard of Oz that I never found myself comparing the two, which is good because nothing could live up to that standard, particularly Arlen and Harburg’s music.

Friday, the first day of summer, promised to be one of the best of my life.  I spend the morning doing more walking around, up Michigan Avenue with its lovely planters to the old Water Tower; along the river across its bridges; and to the Merchandise Mart. What amazes me about Chicago is how an Art Deco building like the Merchandise Mart can coexist with the nearby Gothic, French Renaissance, Structural Expressionist, Beaux Arts, Neoclassical and Chicago Style architecture.  Even the horribly ugly Daley Center is rendered less offensive by its proximity to much handsomer structures.  All I can say about the afternoon’s pilgrimage to Wrigley Field is that it was a dream come true.  It seems smaller in person, but is beyond a doubt the perfect place to watch baseball.  For the record, I paid almost $180 for two tickets in section 240, at the end of row 13; the paid attendance was 41,106; the Cubs beat the White Sox 4-3 off a home-run in the bottom of the 9th.  I was glad to call my dad during “Take Me Out to the Ballgame”.  We beat the crowd back to the Addison station and made our way via bus to a store called Penelope’s in a neighborhood near Wicker Park.  The shop girl explained the abundance of young people was due to the relatively low rent (her three-bedroom was $1,000/mo.)  Miriam bought some nice new clothes.  We rode the train back to the Loop and visited the Art Institute, where we saw many wonderful sculptures and famous paintings.  They even had furniture.  We got in one last evening walk before a late dinner.  The city still felt very safe at eleven o’clock, and the weather was cool and the sidewalks busy.

The next morning we met up with an old friend of Miriam’s, drove through the downtown one last time then had a delightful time at the Brookfield Zoo (gallery coming soon).  We stayed Saturday night at a great hotel nearer to O’Hare.  It was a much better value than the considerably more expensive Hyatt Regency on Wacker Drive. We spent all of Sunday travelling home, including what seemed like an eternity at Hartsfield-Jackson in Atlanta.  I was sitting on the wrong side of the airplane to get a good shot of Gainesville as were were descending, but I got this shot of Waldo Road.  We arrived home at six o’clock on Sunday evening after leaving our hotel at 6:00 AM that morning.  It was a tough day.

I love Chicago, and if it weren’t ludicrously cold for months on end I would want to live there.

I intend to write about my Chicago vacation in detail soon–probably tomorrow–and link to a gallery of the hundreds of photographs I took while in the Windy City, which must surely be among the world’s greatest towns.

For now, though, I thought I’d reflect on something that struck me as interesting during some reading today.  Apparently I am not the only one who considers June 20 to be about the happiest day of the year.  I say about because I am a bit more partial to May 28 for personal reasons, but the first day of summer is the longest day, and in my eyes that makes it good for the same reason that late December is bad: dark = unhappy.

This year, as luck would have it, I spent June 20th fulfilling a lifelong dream of attending a Chicago Cubs baseball game at Wrigley Field.  It was everything I wanted it to be and more.

In any event, though the days are now getting shorter, there is still a long summer to look forward to, and a visit to our nation’s capital seems likely in November.  I am surprised how much I am enjoying travel.

What a sweet word is “home”. Chicago was wonderful, and I loved being there, but it’s good to back with my sweet kitty and to be able to sleep in my own bed tonight.

For the record, I was up at 5:20 AM (CDT), at O’Hare by 6:10 AM, on a plane bound for Atlanta at 8 AM, in Atlanta at 11 AM (EDT) waiting another five before getting on a plane bound for Gainesville at almost 5 PM. Arrived home at 6 PM.